make your way to me
by sarsaparillia
Summary: This time, decide. — Rei/Jadeite.


**disclaimer**: disclaimed.  
**dedication**: to Les, on her birthday, because the other one was so unfair. whoops.  
**notes**: I'm writing happy Rei/Jed, lol what.  
**notes2**: this is a continuation of _no sparks_, and probably won't make sense without it.

**title**: make your way to me  
**summary**: This time, decide. — Rei/Jadeite.

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Rei knew he was going to come.

The Sacred Fire had told her so, but it was also a bone-deep knowledge. He was going to come, and she would have to meet him alone. Ami hadn't been able to calculate exactly when he would come, but her probably of him finding the shrine was a ninety-eight point four percent probability.

Even without Ami's math, Rei knew he would come.

There were just some things you couldn't escape, no matter how much you wanted to. It was almost winter, the dull chill of fall's rain slowly turning to slush. Minako's eyes had been hard when they'd settled into Mamoru's living room to discuss what exactly they ought to do about the King of the Far East.

"We should kill him," Minako had said. "There's no explaining why he's back."

"He didn't recognize her, Mina-chan!" Usagi exclaimed. "We can't know for sure it's him, and we can't know that his intentions are bad! What if he's just someone who _looks_ like him?"

"Better a lookalike dead than the real Jadeite back to life," Minako said.

"It's not your choice, Mina-P," Usagi said. "It's Mamo-chan's. And Rei's."

But really she meant that it was Rei's, because Mamoru had long accepted that the men who had betrayed him had not been the men he'd grown up with. He'd long understood that Beryl had twisted and melded them, and left them for dead. He understood, because he'd _been_ there.

And betrayal was such an easy thing. Ugly, too, but mostly easy.

Minako's nostrils had flared, and she'd crossed her arms, but at the universe-quiet look Usagi had shot her way, she'd relented. "Fine," Minako said, shaking out her long blonde hair. "_Fine_, I can see I'm being overruled. But if he puts one _toe_ out of line…"

"If he puts one toe out of line, I will burn his body to ash, and then dump it on the wind," Rei finished for her.

"Fine," Minako said.

And that was that.

So Rei waited at the shrine, sweeping away the fall leaves. Phobos and Deimos sat on her shoulders, running their breaks affectionately through her hair, tugging playfully at the long dark strands and cawing with mirth when she batted them away.

"I have work to do, you silly birds!" Rei laughed. "Do _you_ want to do the sweeping? I don't think so!"

"Uh… Hino-san?"

Rei whipped around.

_There_ he was.

Of _course_ he would get the jump on her. That was just _typical_ Jadeite, wasn't it, he was always creeping up on her when she was least expecting it. There was a cigarette between his lips, smoking thinly, and Rei was hit with the memory of that rainy day when she'd dropped Usagi's silver lighter, and how he'd been there to pick it up.

It was funny because he was always picking up her broken pieces, even when she didn't want him to.

"Hello," she said, a tiny little quirk to her lips. She tipped her head at him, and her hair fell in a swoop around her. "How can I help you?"

"Look, I don't know if you remember me, I'm Jake—"

"You picked up my lighter," she said. "I remember."

He was staring at her with wild blue eyes, propane-fire eyes, and Rei's chest contracted. The last time he'd looked at her like that had been three nights before he'd run her through with a halberd, when he'd told her he loved her for the first time. Now there was a memory that Rei hadn't wanted at all.

"Who _are_ you?" he asked, desperately. "I _know_ you, but I don't know _how_. And you—you're so—"

"It's good to see you, too, Jadeite," Rei said, a heartbreak in her smile.

Rei had seen memory shock, before. She watched him now for it, waited for the horror of killing and being killed to rush through his system, swirling past and present until neither made sense. He'd been human longer than she had been when the memories had hit, thought; perhaps he would adapt better. Probably not, though, because as she stood there the man called Jake faded in and out.

And then suddenly there he was—her lover, her warrior, her killer. Jadeite.

"Oh, Helios," he breathed. "Mars. _Cyrene_."

He started to reach for her, but stopped. "I—I should go, shouldn't I, I can't—oh, Gods, Cyrene, I'm—"

"My name is Rei, now," she said gently. Her head tipped forward, eyes gone shadowed beneath her bangs. "Cyrene died on the Moon. It was a long time ago."

"You should be angry," he said quietly.

"For a long time, I was," Rei said, and it was true. She had been angry for so, so long—but anger was tiring, and the world had enough anger in it on top of an ancient grudge. The Fire had told her many things, but it had always told her to let go. It had always told her to forgive.

"Are you still angry now?"

"No," Rei said, "No, not anymore."

"Is—is he—?"

"He's fine," Rei answered. "And so is she."

A deep sigh left his chest, ruffling golden hair and the scarf he wore. Rei took one step forward, and then another, and then a third. Jadeite stood stock still, staring at her like she a wild thing liable to snap and rip his throat out at any second. He also didn't look like he was going to stop her if she tried.

"Cyrene—" he said again.

"Rei," she interrupted. "Rei. My name is Rei. And you are Jake. We are not who we used to be, and that is not a bad thing. We have a—chance. To be something good. If you want."

Hesitant, so hesitant, he stretched across the gulf between them, and curled his fingers in the sleeve of her haori, the white stark against his skin. White for purity, always, and it didn't taint when he let go.

There was nothing dark left in him, now.

Rei's heart nearly burst with it.

"Please," she said.

"How could I say no?" he asked and pulled her flush against him. They melted together, two people separated by time and space and an evil so ancient the world had never seen its ilk.

Rei's mouth was hot against his, slick and sweet, and they kissed for a very long time; they kissed until they breathed only each other's air, pressed forehead to forehead, eyes closed, finally close after a millennia.

Very softly, fat thick snowflakes began to fall, and when Rei pulled back, she laughed.

"Would you like to come in?" she asked.

"I'd love to," Jake said.

And so, hand in hand, they slipped inside.

—

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_fin_.


End file.
